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Though it is hard for me to grasp what they might have been thinking, two of the 12 Sarasota County jurors who convicted Joseph P. Smith of first-degree → Read More
When a bill passes with ease and is quickly signed by the governor, and the good intent is obvious and no corporate lobbyist seems to have a secret angle, → Read More
When I heard about Sarasota City Manager Tom Barwin’s big idea for a Lido Key event, I guessed he was just doing some blue-sky fantasizing. → Read More
I have no idea if the people who emailed or talked to me about the ballfield shooting are typical, but I hope some are and some aren’t.Most have said sane and thoughtful words. Maybe that’s the most important thing.But I am bothered by what a local Trump critic, apparently expecting approval, told me she just wrote to a ranking member of Congress. To make it stranger, I read her words at about… → Read More
The local Black Lives Matter chapter just raised an issue worthy of discussion, even if the “demand” made in a written statement could → Read More
No local high school has asked me to give this graduation speech. What the heck?Graduates, congratulations.You have done something difficult. You spent years in institutional buildings trapped with teachers and with each other. You probably also had to pass some tests and do some homework, too. But future employers will mostly be interested to know you stuck it out all this time. You showed up.… → Read More
Assuming the arrest report is accurate, a Sarasota Police officer did exactly right when he boarded a sailboat on Sarasota Bay, clapped its owner in irons → Read More
Though he says he meant something else entirely, a message sent by architect Jerry Sparkman in words and a displayed work of art seems racially charged, → Read More
Maybe it was a tough break for prosecutor Aramis Ayala that the case on her desk in Orlando when she made her I’ll-never-seek-the-death penalty-for-anyone statement happened to involve an alleged cop killer who had also allegedly murdered his pregnant ex-girlfriend.Not a popular guy.But though the elected state attorney based in Orange County could have wished for a more sympathy-inspiring… → Read More
If fairness is any concern, the decision not to offer tax refunds and grants to lure a corporate headquarters to Sarasota County seems like it was the right move.But some economic development promoters insist we should be wringing our hands over it, because that 4-1 vote by the County Commission this week supposedly shot the local economy in the big toe. Now, the argument goes, Sarasota County… → Read More
I'm not a tough sell about the need for principals to deal with disruptive or aggressive kids who repeatedly make learning and life difficult for other students.Reading about cases where troublemaking kids get way too much tolerance as they make other kids miserable can press my buttons. Principals too cautious to act firmly do, too. Teachers can only do so much. Sometimes they need backup.But… → Read More
A lawyer says a man I wrote about last week should have listened to his wife when she urged him not to explain why he's named in the Panama Papers.Randall Northup might have waved a red flag at a federal bull when he breezily gave me his explanation, the attorney says. Northup had told about taking cash to a British Virgin Islands bank in the 1990s, in case a federal attorney decided to try to… → Read More
You may have heard disclaimers warning you not to jump to bad conclusions about all those people being outed for stashing money in offshore accounts.As the journalists releasing the Panama Papers advise, cash is not always stashed that way for reasons connected with illegal drug profits or other ill-gotten gains, or to unlawfully dodge taxes or hide assets from foreclosure judges or divorce… → Read More
These are supposed to be better times for home builders, and Steven Hanson's trail of press coverage as well as his own advertisements have given the impression he was thriving with a focus on creating custom waterfront mansions.Hanson, who is from England and touts building experience in Europe and elsewhere, moved to Sarasota several years ago and founded a few related companies, most notably… → Read More
In Sussex, England, there is a village called Cuckfield, and I would like to suggest that Sarasota take a look at the system used to elect the mayor there.It involves parties, but not in the usual political sense. Each election has an actual party. That is, a get-together held on election night, with drinks and snacks, where attendees do the voting. To make it more fun, everyone gets to vote as… → Read More
When facing an arena full of cap-and-gown-wearing grads expecting to hear something appropriately inspirational to help them leave campus life in an upbeat frame of mind, most commencement speakers play it tediously safe.You know the drill: They urge the grads to take setbacks in stride, make a difference, be bold, and, most of all, dream big and follow their hearts.Only in a movie is there any… → Read More
A magazine headline grabbed me, because it is about a truth we are conditioned to ignore — and because of how it connects to a local housing issue.“The Absurd Primacy of the Automobile in American Life” introduced a new Atlantic article about the incredible expense — in dollars, lives, wasted energy and destruction of people-friendly cities and towns — that we take for granted simply because we… → Read More
Wetland mitigation projects, as I long understood the term, involve major restoration of damaged or destroyed swamplands or estuaries and the like, to restore water flow and some semblance of natural function.Though the wisdom of particular deals is often highly debatable, such restoration projects have often been done at a developer's expense as part of a trade. In return, state or local… → Read More
As with other people arrested for DUI, law officers often had previous incidents in which alcohol was a problematic factor.And as with those other people, cops are often prone to be in denial about the issue until forced to face it. But law officers too frequently face softer consequences when caught in a situation where the same problem would be made emphatically clear to other people. That… → Read More
My column about building permit notices going out to many hundreds of Sarasota County residents inspired quite a few people to vent about their very related hassles.I can only hope some of these stories are not the norm. → Read More